


I'm done with the life

by virginie



Category: A Day In the Life of a Poolshark (Music Video)
Genre: M/M, Not RPF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 14:49:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1095263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/virginie/pseuds/virginie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His face had been banged up enough in the crash that no one realised half the damage was already done, put there by Joe's loving fists. </p><p> </p><p>  <i>The music video canon for this story is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vs3K7YulfVg">'A Day in the Life of a Pool Shark'</a> by Idiot Pilot. This story treats the band members as original characters (i.e. not RPF).</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm done with the life

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Thursday_Next](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thursday_Next/gifts).



> Dear Thursday_Next, we got matched on Parks and Recreation, and for quite a while I planned to write a Parks and Rec story for you, but as I went back and re-read your notes and other requests I found myself getting more and more interested in 'A Day in the Life of a Pool Shark'.
> 
> This short story begins on the night of the events in the video. I've given the characters their own names to fully separate them from the band members – and I've given them a different and much older van. The story is also inspired by the lyrics of 'Retina and the Sky'.
> 
> The title is part of a lyric from 'A Day in the Life of a Pool Shark'.

In a daze, the man stepped carefully down from his truck. He walked over the cold hard ground, his boots crunching on splashes of broken glass, and drew his jacket on as he walked; the chill in the air was cold enough for frost.

The night was quiet apart from the metallic tick tick tick of a cooling engine. The rear of the old Bedford van was caved in, twisted and crushed.

There was no hint of movement inside. He wrenched open the passenger door and leaned in to look at the still bodies of two young men. Nothing but blood and silence met him. Not a breath, not a gasp, not a cough.

A heartbeat later he drew a searing breath into his own lungs and sobbed it out again with fear and shock. He leaned over the floppy haired man sprawled on the passenger seat, fingers searching his neck for a pulse. He was still warm.

“Are you alright?” he gasped, looking across to the driver, his voice rising in panic. Blood slid along the driver’s cheekbone from a meaty looking patch in his dark hair. He was slumped awkwardly forward over the steering wheel.

The man staggered back to his truck, climbed up to the cab on jittery legs and radioed for help. Contact made, he grabbed his water bottle and his dusty first aid kit and jumped down again.

The impact with the ground was unexpectedly painful. He collapsed onto his back and lay looking at the stars, his head swimming with light, his body throbbing with pain, until everything faded to black.

 

Tony lay on plain sheets, his face stripped of its colour by two weeks under hospital fluoros. The bruises and cuts on his face had mostly healed, leaving yellowish clouds on his skin. In a few days they would be gone too. His face had been banged up enough in the crash that no one realised half the damage was already done, put there by Joe's loving fists.

Tony's hair was too long now and it was getting greasy. Didn’t stop some of the younger nurses flirting though—Joe had to suppress a grin every time one of them came by while he was on his break. The worst change was Tony’s weight. Joe couldn’t believe how much he’d lost in two weeks, and he'd been stringy to begin with. He looked 18 again, young and vulnerable. His left wrist lay on the grey blanket, tubes snaking up his arm. He was looking at Joe, frustration all over his face.

At first Tony just slept all the time, but Joe visited him anyway. Two minutes to run up three corridors and take the lift to Tony’s ward, eleven minutes to sit with him, and then two minutes to get back down to the hospital kitchens. He did it twice a day during his shift, and then stayed with him afterwards until visiting hours ended – except on Sundays, when he had all day to spend at Tony's side. Sadie, the head cook, always gave him a kind smile when she saw him racing back to his post by the swinging kitchen doors. She clearly thought such devotion to a friend became a young man, but as likely as not he’d turn halfway through his shift and catch her looking at his ass.

Joe was staying at a nearby hostel with only a duffel bag to his name, hustling pool every night to supplement his dishwasher wages and pay the hospital bills. All their savings had gone on the bills, along with the dream of buying much needed new gear. Worse, they'd lost everything they already owned—none of their amps, computers, or instruments had survived the crash. The beloved old van they'd boosted when leaving the boy's home together at 17 and 18—kept together with spit and a prayer ever since—was a write-off. Joe felt sick when he thought about it. Everything gone. Everything they'd built and worked for. All dust. Finally he'd had to cancel the hard-won string of gigs they'd booked in small bars and clubs for the coming autumn. And that was maybe what hurt most of all.

Tony was still looking at him, but the anger was gone. He was drifting now, half asleep. He'd be okay; even with broken bones, concussion and internal bleeding: two weeks in hospital and he was thoroughly on the mend. But if the truck driver hadn't called for help before passing out, Tony could have died. Joe didn't want to think about that. In a few days he would have to break him out. They couldn't afford another week. He eyed the crutches in the corner, as yet untried. They'd steal them.

Joe gingerly felt along the stitches on the side of his own head. His shaved hair was growing back, itchy. He wore a beanie at night when he hustled pool, so he didn't look like a freak.

 

It had taken Joe a while to get used to the silence.

The truck driver's bed was down the end of the coma ward, by a window. Two weeks after the crash he was sporting a full beard. His skin had paled just like Tony’s, but his eyes looked less sunken, as though the rest had been good for him.

Joe came to visit him every morning before his shift. He was the only person who visited, the nurses said. The man seemed to have no family or friends.

Joe even held his hand sometimes, unembarrassed, and talked to him about how thankful he was, how he'd called for help before he passed out and how that had saved Tony's life. He'd tell him that as soon as he woke up he could start his own life again. The nurses said talking would help, and they gave Joe special permission to visit, even though he wasn't family.

Joe had come to for a few seconds and seen the flashing lights of an ambulance reflected in the rearview mirror of the van. He'd turned his head painfully, blinking away the blood that blurred everything, his heart pounding, to try and get a look at Tony.

They’d cut open his door and lifted him out onto a stretcher. As he was carried to the ambulance things made sense again for a moment and he saw the round face of a young woman looking down at him. “You're awake,” she’d said. “Can you tell me your name?” She must have read his mind, because his throat wouldn’t open to form the question, but she’d answered, as clear as a bell, “He's alive.”

Joe found himself looking at his blunt fingers as he sat next to the truck driver's bed. His hands were a mess. They were dry and red and wrinkled, the skin around his nails beginning to crack. Later they would get swollen and sodden from hours of dunking pots in and out of steaming hot water. It was hard to imagine them on someone else's skin.

He peeled a tiny strip of dead skin away from beside his thumbnail with his teeth, drawing blood at the end. The truck driver just lay there, breathing almost imperceptibly, growing his beard. He was peaceful company; his hands calloused from years of holding a wheel. Joe wondered if he'd ever done anything else.

Tony, on the other hand, when fully awake, was a frigging nightmare. In fact Joe would choose a nightmare any day over Tony in this mood. He hated everything, hated how useless he felt, hated that he was a burden on Joe instead of helping him pay their bills and get back on their feet. But how do you tell your only friend there’s no point in bitching because he’s a burden you can’t live without? Like how if you carry a pack long enough taking it off feels wrong—you’ve lost your centre of balance.

There was no point looking to the truck driver for help, Joe thought, as he worried the skin around his nail. Well, his name was Steven, Steven Holland. But aside from being in a coma, it was sadly obvious he didn't have a Tony in his life.

 

It was a weird consequence of their crash, but Joe almost had more time to himself now than he’d had since he and Tony had ditched the home nearly six years ago. And hours spent each day on boring repetitive tasks like scrubbing pots really gave a man time to think. It wasn’t that he didn’t already know stuff about himself. He knew he wanted to keep playing if he could, no matter what else happened. That one was pretty simple; he loved making music. He didn't care about making it big or being famous, all he wanted was to be a working musician, even though right now that meant starting over again from scratch. There was something else though—no point in hiding from it—he wanted to do it with Tony. They came together on stage, or even just fooling around on unplugged guitars in the back of the van, in a way that was an intense high and coming home all mashed together. He needed that feeling. Most days it was why he existed.

What else? He'd always told himself he’d like to settle down one day with a special woman and have some kids—give them a normal happy childhood, two parents, a backyard, holidays, that kind of thing. But he knew that he wanted to stick with Tony too, so how was that going to work? Simple things—like the fact he'd rather hustle pool than read a book—he never lied about stuff like that—but he was starting to see he'd been lying to himself about the big things for years now.  

So why did he keep trying to avoid the fight? Tony had forced the issue, and fists meeting flesh had seemed to be a beginning or an end, but the crash had let them both back safely off again. Why had he held Tony back every other time he'd tried? The uncomfortable truth was he’d preferred to run away from it, he’d preferred to leave the damned thing alone, keep Tony at arm's length and fight for the other stuff, the music. Because if it didn’t start then it couldn't end, and if it didn't end then Tony wouldn't leave.

 

On his last break of the day Joe decided to skip his usual routine of corridors and lifts and short visits, and go outside with the girls from the kitchen instead. He found them huddled against a damp concrete wall where a few stunted trees made a windbreak of sorts, puffing away on cigarettes.

But instead of joining them he pressed his back into the wall of D-Block opposite, and watched them across the lean garden and the stained paving stones of the courtyard. They looked and sounded just as satisfied—or dissatisfied—with their lot as any group of people; little bursts of laughter and gossip, bitching about the bosses, their partners, plans for escape. Gemma, at least he thought that was her name, turned and gave him a smile, an invitation to come over, but he just smiled back and shook his head.

He watched them smoking in the chill air in their ill-fitting uniforms—seemingly designed to do as little as possible for any sort of female shape—and the truth took his breath away, as sharp and cold as the wind, Tony was the only reason he even got out of bed. The only reason he'd survived the last few years of care, the only reason he'd discovered music, the only reason for anything. He was over fighting. Gooseflesh rose up all the way along his bare arms. He bent his back against the wind and went inside.

 

He’d woken in the dark sweating; fear crawling up his spine, not knowing anything. Not where he was, not even if Tony was alive.

He’d yanked out the tube in his arm and lurched out of bed. He’d made his way through the dark wards until he found a night nurse on duty in a tiny pool of light, and he’d overborne all her objections and attempts to get him back to bed, and made her take him to find Tony.

Joe’s heart hadn’t stopped pounding until he was looking down at Tony’s head on his flat pillow on the bed. His face was badly smashed up. Joe could see lumps under the covers made by the cast on his arm and leg and the bandages around his chest, but he was breathing, and his good arm was twitching a bit. Joe’s chest flooded with warmth. He couldn’t stop himself reaching for Tony’s hand, and he'd turned away from the nurse to hide his face.

They'd released him the next day and he begged a job in the kitchens. He found out what happened. The truck driver, Steven, had fallen asleep at the wheel and ploughed into the back of Tony and Joe's beloved van as they slowed for an intersection. He must have fallen asleep just moments before he hit them, as he'd already cut his speed. He'd sustained a serious head injury in the crash, but somehow kept functioning long enough to open Tony's door and call for help. They'd found him on the ground below his cab with a burst open first-aid kit and a bottle of water leaking slowly into the dirt.

 

Joe fell into his bunk early that night, exhausted and grateful for some peace. He'd avoided visiting Tony after his shift, too raw to face him. It was too early for the other guys, and the room was empty. He crashed into a deep slumber and woke around two. Dim light leaked through the thin curtains from the street and showed him sleeping bodies in the other bunks. The room smelled of warm male sweat and was filled with the gentle hum of breathing.

He had a strange feeling twisting his stomach; the remnant of an uneasy dream, and an image of Tony stuck in his mind. Tony asleep across from him in the room they shared in the home—ugly pattern on the carpet, on the curtains, on the wallpaper—Tony asleep on his back, night after night, one arm flung out. The distance had always seemed impossible to bridge. 

 

On his first break of the day Joe went back to Steven Holland, sitting next to him and talking quietly about what Steven would see out the window if he opened his eyes.

There was a small beeping sound breaking the usual quiet. Suddenly two doctors and three nurses rushed into the ward and down to Steven's bed. An orderly wheeled in an extra machine and they hooked it up, crowding around the bed and pushing Joe out of the way. They worked urgently, in tense silence.

Joe stood there helplessly watching, not understanding what was happening. No one paid him any attention.

He stood there, his throat closing up, as Steven Holland died, and for some reason all he could focus on were his reddened fingers dripping blood onto the floor where he'd torn away the skin.

 

Joe didn’t go back to the kitchen after that. Instead, he went to see Tony.

He stood, almost swaying on his feet, looking down at Tony’s face, all pulled and anxious in sleep. Joe was still wearing his dirty jeans and snap front dishwasher's shirt, but Tony looked beautiful and wonderful. Joe's feet were sore inside his boots and his whole body ached. Tiredness hit him like a wave. He toppled gracelessly onto Tony’s bed, avoiding everything that would hurt, and shoved his face into Tony's neck.

Tony was stale breath and warm skin, and Joe closed eyes that felt like they’d been boiled for weeks and fell asleep.

He might have been dreaming when he sensed floppy hair on his face, a sleep-logged voice urging him to wake. “It’s alright,” he said to the Tony in his dream, “We're okay.”

 

So Tony was the one who broke them out in the middle of the day, stole the crutches, made sure the last hospital bill had been paid, wrote a polite and apologetic note to Sadie in the kitchens, and picked up Joe's duffel and his own surviving clothes from the locker at the hostel.

“What are we going to do?” Joe asked him in a diner.

"Where are we going to go?" he asked again in a small hotel room in a different city.

"Will we be okay?" he asked, as Tony kissed him on his mouth and then his collarbone and then his chest between the nipple and the armpit.

Tony didn't answer in words. He just organised everything and started to put their lives back together. He got a telemarketing job and Joe hustled pool and they lived in a single room, and six months later Tony was fully healed and they had enough money to buy some second hand gear and a beat up old van and start again.

But that first week in their single room Tony had found an acoustic guitar in a second-hand shop and bought it home. He strung it and tuned it and handed it to Joe, who wrote his first love song.


End file.
